DownloadThe Portobello Bookshop Gift Guide 2024

Sunburn

Shortlisted for the Polari First Book Prize 2024

Chloe Michelle Howarth author

Format:Paperback

Publisher:Verve Books

Published:22nd Jun '23

Should be back in stock very soon

Sunburn cover

It's the early 1990s, and in the Irish village of Crossmore, Lucy feels out of place. Despite her fierce friendships, she's always felt this way, and the conventional path of marriage and motherhood doesn't appeal to her at all. Not even with handsome and doting Martin, her closest childhood friend.
Lucy begins to make sense of herself during a long hot summer, when a spark with her school friend Susannah escalates to an all-consuming infatuation, and, very quickly, to a desperate and devastating love.
Fearful of rejection from her small and conservative community, Lucy begins living a double life, hiding the most honest parts of herself in stolen moments with Susannah.
But with the end of school and the opportunity to leave Crossmore looming, Lucy must choose between two places, two people and two futures, each as terrifying as the other. But only one can offer her real happiness.
Sunburn is an astute and tender portrayal of first love, adolescent anxiety and the realities of growing up in a small town where tradition holds people tightly in its grasp.

'A tender and heartfelt coming-of-age tale' * Heat *
A deeply moving, heartfelt love story * Daily Mail *
A tender evocation of that time between adolescence and early adulthood and the accompanying rites of passage * Irish Times *
This is a compassionate take on the push and pull between what's expected and what is felt. * The Herald *
A tender coming-of-age novel and a heartfelt sapphic love story * ELLE Canada *

ISBN: 9780857308412

Dimensions: unknown

Weight: unknown

288 pages